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Saturday, April 3, 2010

Doing the Math on Costs of New Health Reform Law

Here is the math on new $ 1 trillion health reform law, to be phased on over 10 years.

1. Where money will come from – 49% cuts, 51 % new taxes and fees.

In descending order of magnitude

 Cutting Medicare payments Cutting payments to Medicare Advantage plans Other savings from Medicare and SCHIP (state childrens program) Smaller payments to hospitals serving the poor Cuts in long term insurance Education cuts for doctors and other health professionals Higher Medicare taxes (households making over $1 million will pay 3/4 of new taxes) Fees on drug and device companies and insurers Penalties of businesses and individuals who do not comply with mandates

Conclusion - Medicare recipients, teaching hospitals, providers of drugs, devices, and insurance, and busineses and individuals who fail to follow mandates take the hit.

Conclusion - Subsidies for the poor and middle class who cannot afford care, current and new Medicaid recipients, and a fraction of small businesses get benefits, and the states which help shoulder costs of Medicaid, take much of the hit.

Summary

On balance, the new law is about adding costs to cover 32 million previously uninsured , saving Medicare costs, adding new taxes for Medicare recipients, wealthy households, drug, device, and insurance companies, mandated young and small businesses who previously chose not to pay health insurance, and increasing taxes and fees.

The Health Reform Maze

Buy the Book

Book Description: In this first book in a series of four, Richard L. Reece, MD. provides a unique view of the roll out, and run up, of the Affordable Care Act. Reece shows in this book the progress and facets of ObamaCare's marketers and messengers, as the day approached for the launch of health insurance exchanges - the single most public and problematic portion of the new law. This is a must read for anyone who wants to chronicle this attempt to organize more than one-sixth of the U.S. economy by adding layers of federal government control and regulations.

Reece has been writing about U.S. health care for more than 45 years. His knowledge and experience, added to his keen intellect and gift of subtle humor, make this book a valuable part of anyone's collection.